Arab-Islamic Conference In Support of Iran’s Revolution and Resistance
Written by
Shamsi Saadati
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As part of its solidarity with the Iranian people’s resistance and uprising, the “Committee of Arab Islamic Solidarity with the Iranian Resistance” (CAISIR) hosted a conference in Brussels on January 27.
The conference was attended by prominent personalities from Jordan, Syria, Tunisia, Algeria, Yemen, Iraq, Sudan, and Mauritania.
Several renowned figures from the coalition of the Syrian opposition revolutionary forces, including Mr. Nazir Hakim, Mr. Bashar Alhakim (deputy chair of the National Coalition), Mr. Haytham Maleh, Mr. Anwar Malek, former rapporteur of the Arab League, and Mr. Ahmad Kamel attended the conference.
Jordanian dignitaries, Dr. Musa AlMaani, former advising minister at the Office of the Prime Minister; Dr. Asma Al Rawahna, chair of the National Coalition Faction of the Parliament; Mr. Hayel Dawoodieh, former Minister of Endowments, and Dr. Ismaeel Al Mashaqeba, MP, addressed the conference.
Other interlocutors in the Arab-Islamic Conference in Belgium included Mr. Mustafa Allouch, Secretary of the National Council of Lebanon; Mr. Hatem Al Sir Ali, former Minister of Commerce and Transportation from Sudan; Dr. Mohammad Jomeih, Yemen’s Ambassador to UNESCO; Mr. AbdulWahab Mouawadha, MP and chair of the Human Rights Committee in the Parliament of Yemen, Mr. Abdolsalam Hormeh, MP from the Parliament of Mauritania and head of the Sawab Faction, Mr. Ramzi Farj, former MP from Tunisia, Dr. Waleed Al Rawi, a political-military researcher and analyst from Iraq, and Ms. Hanan AbdulLatif, head of the European Branch of Rafidayn Human Rights, Iraq.
The event and its attendees expressed their opinion about the heroic fight of the Iranian people despite the regime’s severe crackdown in Iran.
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With NCRI President-elect Mrs. Maryam Rajavi as a keynote speaker, the prospect of overthrowing and replacing the clerical dictatorship, the mullahs’ destructive regional influences, and the necessity of proscribing the regime’s Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) as a terrorist entity was discussed. They also referred to the leading role of the NCRI’s main constituent group, Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), as the uprising’s driving force.
In her remarks to the conference, Mrs. Rajavi underlined that “The uprising has persisted at the cost of at least 750 lives and the arrest and torture of 30,000 protesters. It is a critical moment not only for the future of Iran but also for the destiny of the entire Middle East. There is no doubt that it will also have an impact on the world.”
“During the current uprising, the people of Iran have refuted both the past and present regimes thousands of times by their chants of “down with the oppressor, be it the shah or the mullahs’ supreme leader” and similar slogans. As such, the Iranian people have rejected all forms of dictatorship,” she added.
Overthrowing the mullahs’ regime is a prerequisite to liberating #Iran & Middle East of the scourge of religious extremism, terrorism, & warmongering – Speech to the Arab-Islamic Conference in Brussels,“Solidarity with the Iranian people’s democratic revolution”#BlacklistIRGC pic.twitter.com/xsQNVyB7uM
— Maryam Rajavi (@Maryam_Rajavi) January 27, 2023
Dr. Anwar Malek- the former rapporteur of the Arab League, was the next speaker. He stressed that the Iranian regime could not be changed except with the help of Iranians. According to Dr. Malek, the history of Iran has taught us that there is no change in Iran except for the commitment of Iranians themselves.
Emphasizing the key role of Iranian women in leading the uprising, Dr. Malek also added that throughout the history of Iran, there had been no change except that Iranian women were at the forefront, and he put weight on this very aspect as the root of his optimism.
Dr. Malek also said that Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, who is leading the Iranian Resistance, states that change is inevitable and that the determination of the oppressed Iranian women who resists all kinds of tyranny, it will end the terrorism practiced by a corrupt system.
Referring to how slogans and images of the martyrs as well as the leaders of the Iranian Resistance are spread throughout Iran, Dr. Malek hinted it is good news that showed the resistance is not only limited to existence outside the country but rather that it is based in Iran and that those who are attending events here are only the ambassadors of this resistance.
الآن بدأت فعاليات مؤتمر بروكسل للتضامن العربي مع المقاومة الإيرانية ودعم انتفاضة الشعب الإيراني التي تبشر بالسلام والأخوة مع شعوب المنطقة.. pic.twitter.com/kbjzMVLwm9
— أنور مالك (@anwarmalek) January 27, 2023
Dr. Malek also highlighted the importance that even the cities that were considered by the Mullahs as strongholds of their Supreme Leader are now witnessing the burning of portraits of Ali Khamenei, Qassem Soleimani, and even Ruhollah Khomeini, which proves that the revolution has become an extended popular sentiment in all corners of Iran.
Mr. Malek called on the international community, particularly the Arab League, for a rejection of Iranian regime’s ambassadors from all countries and hand over Iran’s embassies to the Iranian Resistance as the legitimate representative of the Iranian people, confronting the terror network of the regime in the Arab world as well as to establish an international court to prosecute Tehran’s crimes against the people of Iran, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Lebanon, and other countries.
Dr. Asma Al Rawahna, chair of the National Coalition Faction of the Jordanian Parliament, was also among the event’s speakers. She first spoke of the “long struggle history of Iranian women and the extent of suffering, deprivation, and torture that they are subjected to on a daily basis.” Referring to the Iranian women’s plight, Dr. Rawahna underlined that “These abuses only increase women’s determination to achieve freedom and justice.
While stressing that the Iranian women’s struggle is not limited to the removal of the mandatory hijab, she said: “I am against this statement because the veil has never been a problem of controversy. When we talk about women and say that women are half of society, women, my brothers, are the whole of society.
Referring to the Islamic extremists who use religion to promote their backward thinking Dr. Rawahna said: “This is the manipulation of religions in order to make people ignorant. They are using religion in order to underestimate people’s minds and to kill freedom. This a catastrophe that our Arab and Islamic world has been exposed to. This is systematic and, unfortunately, so that tyrants are always at the helm of power, and religion is always invoked as an excuse for everything they say and do. Islam is a religion of freedom, a religion of love, a religion of respect, a religion of peace, a religion of tolerance, a religion of trust, a religion equalizes men and women with rights and duties.”
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In a video message to the conference, former Lebanese Justice Minister Ashraf Rifi underlined that the Iranian people have risen to present a moderate and developed model of government that leads Iran and its people towards progress and development and not to go back, and to adopt a reactionary religious thought that is as close as possible to the takfiri thought adopted by ISIS and its ilk.
He also emphasized that the salvation of Iran at the hands of its revolutionaries is a salvation for the entire region so that it can return to living in peace, harmony, and cooperation.
“I salute the Iranian opposition and the MEK, which is a shining star in Iran’s long night. Greetings to the Iranian Revolution and the MEK, who are making Iran’s spring get it out of the harsh winter,” Minister Rifi said, praising the MEK’s role in the struggle for freedom in Iran.
“If one day, the people wanted life, then fate must respond, the night must clear, and the shackles must be broken. O heroic Iranian people, our eyes are fixed on you to liberate your homeland and build a state of justice, truth, and freedom. Be confident that victory is yours and victory is in the interest of you, all neighboring countries, and the whole world,” he added.
Hatem Al Sir Ali, former Minister of Commerce and Transportation from Sudan, also voiced his support of the Iranian people’s revolution and the Resistance while condemning the regime’s meddling in the African and Arab countries’ affairs. He said that Sudan confronted the regime harshly because Tehran taught and trained the former regime in Khartoum on brutal and oppressive methods of torture, torturing activists and detainees in a way that all people knew about.
He also emphasized that all the conference’s panelists have gathered to announce loudly and clearly their position of solidarity and welcome to what he considered the “blessed uprising” that is taking place now in all Iranian cities. “But honestly, my respect and admiration for the leadership of Sister Maryam Rajavi increased because she leads on different paths diplomatically.”
He said that they had seen uprisings and revolutions even in Sudan. But they have gone through three and four uprisings. Yet, those uprisings were weeks old at maximum. He asserted that if the uprising in Iran has persisted, it is not out of the blue, but it stems from a culture of struggle, a culture of oppressed resistance in Iran that is more than four decades old and led by the Iranian Resistance Movement, spearheaded by MEK.
Hatem Al Sir Ali concluded his remarks by announcing that they are completely supportive, endorsing, and standing clearly with this uprising, not because of the interests of Iran, the Iranian revolution, or the Iranian youth, or resistance, even to our interests as Arabs and the Arab nation, because there is no security. “There is no stability or peace in this region with the presence of the mullahs.”
Another speaker, Dr. Waleed Al Rawi, a political-military researcher and analyst from Iraq, began his remarks by saluting “the Iranian people in their great revolution, and I sincerely wish them continuation and success until they achieve their goals in eliminating the mullahs’ regime and ridding the world of this criminal system.”
In his remarks, Dr. Al Rawi underlined that the MEK was the first to know the criminal nature of the regime, which, unfortunately, succeeded in exporting its dark and criminal ideas to my country Iraq and before that to Lebanon, then Syria and Yemen.
He also condemned how the regime has spread terrorism, corruption, drugs, and murder throughout the Middle East and asserted that if not stopped, it will even expand to any part of the world where Khamenei and his agents see a foothold.
“Your revolution is not only a hope for the Iranian people but also for the Iraqi, Syrian, Lebanese, Yemeni, Bahraini, and Saudi people.”
As a former Iraqi officer, he testified that the MEK “forces were characterized by qualities that the best armies in the world were incapable of in terms of discipline, morale, high organization, and superior combat courage. I have witnessed with my own eyes many women fighters, women who refuse to be evacuated and are badly wounded.”
Praising the Iranian’s people fight against the clerical dictatorship, Mrs. Hanan Abdullatif, head of the European Branch of Rafidayn Human Rights, Iran appreciated the efforts of NCRI President-elect Mrs. Maryam Rajavi in leading a steadfast struggle movement since the overthrow of the Shah regime in 1979 and added that ever since Iranian women have been at the forefront of the uprisings against a corrupt dictatorial system.
According to Mrs. Abdullatif, in defending the rights of the collective and despite all kinds of torture, oppression, disappearance, liquidation, and the execution of death sentences against the Iranian people and Iranian women in particular, the fighters in the opposition movement successfully forced their will on the United Nations to expel the regime’s delegation from the UN Committee on the Status of Women.
In his remarks, Mustafa Allouch, Secretary of the National Council of Lebanon, said that Mrs. Rajavi’s speech could be the nucleus of a new constitution for the future of Iran instead of the absurd and trivial constitution that Khomeini put in place and is now what manages the existing backwardness mentality in Iran.
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He also paid tribute to the great people of Iran who broke the collar of fear in challenging one of the worst religious dictatorships in the history of mankind, which is a backward dictatorship of the Velayat-e faqih. Mr. Allouch also said that by looking at the pictures of the new martyrs, he also remembers the thousands of martyrs who were hanged at the hands of the current president of Iran, Raisi, and he is now playing around and having fun as if nothing had happened.
He asserted that the Iranian people are waging a battle to liberate the region from fear of ignorance and underdevelopment through the launch of genuine cooperation that leads to the elevation of our people and their exit from crises and death that surrounds them.
He also described the MEK as the Iranian people’s “vanguard,” which has always been playing the leading role. The MEK defeated the old regime, and it is the one who will triumph over this existing regime because there is no way to stifle freedom.
“I am sure that the Revolutionary Guards and its cohorts will fight and kill, and there will be more blood, but in the end, these people will win because freedom is stronger than even life,” he added.
Allouch also emphasized that the backward regime of the mullahs kidnapped the revolution from its pioneers and killed and exiled the elite of the Iranian people, some of whom we still see today. Your role now is to restore peace and prosperity in the region so that the cycle of violence and death stops.
He also pointed out the regime’s destructive role in Lebanon by wasting the Iranian people’s money to fund Hezbollah.
He also stressed that the Iran revolution is an extension of Dr. Mossadeq’s movement. “Therefore, as I heard from Mrs. Rajavi, I believe that this revolution will not turn back the clock and bring about an authoritarian regime that is monarchical, civil, or anything else. It will bring a democratic system based on the choice of people who struggled and uprooted dictatorships,” he concluded.
Calling for expanding sanctions on influential Iranian officials, including ministers, commanders, and military personnel, Mrs. Abdullatif supported the European Parliament’s vote on the designation of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organization.
Accenting that the Iranian people revolted against oppression, corruption, and the immoral and inhumane practices of a criminal system that spreads terrorism in the region, Ms. Abdullatif added that this cry was loud and demanding the overthrow of the clerical system and that it was not for the removal of the hijab or religious dissolution, as the regime’s propaganda apparatus claims. Hence, it is important to understand the essence of the sacrifices that the Iranian people are making and the efforts of the Iranian Resistance led by Mrs. Maryam Rajavi against a terrorist system, she explained.
Hayel Dawoodieh, Jordan’s former Minister of Endowments, was also among the event’s interlocutors. He said: In 1979, the Iranian people started their revolution to liberate themselves from tyranny, and they were able to achieve victory. Instead of siding with our just causes, Khomeini plunged the Arab region into a spiral of sectarian and ethnic conflicts. His regime was a party to all the wars and conflicts that raged in the region, in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen, and turned these countries into a group of failed states.
He also asserted that for over forty years of dictatorial rule practiced by the ruling regime in Iran, which exhausted the Iranian people and destroyed their capabilities in the name of Islam. But this action and this method of domination is not part of Islam at all, and rather it has distorted the image of Islam in the whole world.
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He also wished the Iranian people to achieve their goals of freedom and prosperity and for their free will to prevail in the establishment of a democratic state that leads the Iranian people with all its ethnic and religious groups on the path of progress and prosperity and to build good and positive relations with all neighboring countries on the basis of cooperation, good neighborliness, and non-interference in internal affairs.
He also praised the Iranian Resistance’s great sacrifices for the well-being of the Iranian people while expressing his hope that it would be crowned with success for the benefit of Iran and its surroundings, especially the Arabs.
“We condemn the violence and repression practiced by the Iranian authorities against the Iranian people who aspire for a better tomorrow,” he concluded his remarks.
Ahmad Kamel from the Syrian opposition, who moderated the event, described Iran as a country of revolutions and uprisings.
After asking why this revolution lasted more than all its predecessors, he said that the reason was the existence of the MEK’s organized resistance units that are the engine of the continuation of this revolution despite the great sacrifices and despite the absolute suppression of the revolution by the Iranian regime.
He pointed to how the Iranian people, in their demonstrations, demanded freedom and rejected any form of tyranny. They reject Shah’s regime and the mullahs’ regime. This is summed up in the slogan of ‘death to the oppressor, be it the Shah or the Supreme Leader..’
He underlined that the conference’s panel of imminent Arab personalities has gathered to “ support the revolution of the Iranian people against a tyrannical, hostile regime that kills the Iranian people and the peoples of the region and drowns them in a sea of blood and destruction. It is a regime that poses an existential threat to the Iranian people and a danger to the people of the region, especially the Arab people.
Mr. Kamel said that Iran is a great nation, with millions of people wanting freedom and dignity for themselves and their neighbors. He also underlined that the Iranian regime recognizes that this revolution is different from all previous uprisings and the volatile situation inside Iran. The activity of the organized resistance network inside Iran will advance this uprising toward the overthrow of the regime.
He also stressed that the overthrow of the Iranian regime would liberate the Iranian people. Iraq, Syria, Yemen, and Lebanon from a monster that destroyed their countries and killed countless numbers of their children. “The Iranian regime is a monster that took the issue of Palestine hostage to cover up its shame and heinous crimes,” he added.
“We are in the headquarters of the European Union, which did not pay attention to the Iranian people or the Arab peoples and did not even pay attention to the demands of the European people and the European Parliament, considering this regime as a terrorist regime.”
He also demanded the Western government abandon the approach of appeasement toward the Iranian regime and not submit to the treachery of the terrorist Revolutionary Guard, which is in fact, a terrorist, and it must be placed on the European list of terrorism.
In his remarks, Jordanian MP Dr. Ismaeel Al Mashaqeb asserted that the Iranian regime is an enemy of humanity and religion. We are here against a brutal, repressive, terrorist regime that annihilates its people and the people of the region in the name of Islam.
He underlined his support of the Iranian Resistance against the brutal and terrorist regime to tell the world to stand with this blessed resistance against this regime that spreads like cancer.
In his speech, Dr. Musa AlMaani, former advising minister at the Office of the Jordanian Prime Minister, referred to the recent pathetic moves by the remnants of the deposed dictatorship in 1979, in line with the Iranian regime against the Iranian Resistance and the revolution. He called the inept notion and rhetoric of the mullahs’ regime and the remnants of Shah’s remnants, and their unified stance against the democratic revolution of the Iranian people. He also expressed his support for the Iranian Resistance movement and people’s democratic aspirations.
Mr. Bashar Alhakim (deputy chair of the Syrian National Coalition) was also among the event’s speakers. He said that the mullahs’ religious fascism regime followed the footprints of the fascist Shah’s regime, during which all ethnicities were subjected to oppression to different degrees. While referring to Shah’s crimes against Kurdish people and their leaders, he said that the mullahs’ regime continued the same policy of oppression towards the Kurds.
He also saluted the position of the PMOI, which emphasizes and advocates the principle of equal rights among the various Iranian components, regardless of ethnicity or religion.
He also said that since its formation, the National Council of Resistance affirmed that the autonomy of the various nationalities in Iran within the framework of Iran’s territorial integrity is a requirement for Iran’s democracy and independence.
Saluting the nationwide uprising in Iran, Ramiz Faraj, former MP from Tunisia, said that “Iran is giving a lesson; a lesson of speaking out when facing injustice. Iran is rising today as an organized revolution, expanding in most of its cities in the north, the south, the east, and the west. And if its spark began with the killing of a Kurdish sister, the Kurds, unfortunately, are always destined to be at the forefront.”
“What can we as Arabs do to support the Iranian revolution,” Mr. Faraj questioned, and then he explained how the people of the Arab world should express solidarity with the aspirations of the Iranian people rather than what he referred to as the foreign interference by the clerical regime that is taking place in Iraq, Syria and other countries.
“Now, five months have passed and counting since the Iranian revolution. But it is a revolution to end this backward rule in Iran,” Mr. Ahmed Al-Jarallah, the editor-in-chief of the Kuwaiti newspapers Arab Times and Al-Seyassah, said. “For forty-three years, they ruled Iran with iron and fire, with a bad culture, interfering in the affairs of neighbors and harming the whole world, not just the glorious and great Iranian people who overthrew the Shah. Even if this rule is different from the rule of the Shah, it still practiced cruelty, abuse, and persecution of people. Despite their cruel effort to stop the revolution, they failed.”
He added: “The Arab world and Iran’s neighbors must help this great person in their revolution, and they need to stand with them. Initially, there was a worry that in confronting the regime, this revolution might fail. But these great people proved that they are no longer afraid of the revolutionary courts. They showed they are no longer afraid of prison, physical abuse, or anything else.”
In the end, Mr. Jarrallah wished the Iranian people and their revolution to succeed.
Dr. Abdolsalam Hormeh, MP from the Parliament of Mauritania, started his speech by congratulating the NCRI President-elect, Ms. Maryam Rajavi, “for the decisive moment which will be the beginning of the liberation of the Iranian people and the people of the region from the most dangerous racist regime that exists.”
Comparing the clerical dictatorship in Iran with the apartheid regime in South Africa, he admired the decisions made by the Moroccan and Senegalese governments to close the Iranian regime’s embassy in their countries and called on other countries to follow their lead.
“I conclude that it is absolutely impossible, as my Yemeni colleague said, to expect liberation or sovereignty from a regime that kills and tortures its people, as is the case with the Iranian regime right now,” he added. “I hope, God willing, for this revolution to succeed, and I hope that it will be the beginning of a return of a strong Iran to an Arab-Islamic neighborhood that cooperates with its neighbors, free of the scourge of dictatorship and ruled by democracy.”
Starting his speech with how the former Iranian regime’s Supreme Leader Khomeini has exploited and defamed Islam, Mr. Heitham Maleh, a renowned Syrian opposition figure, said: “The religious fascism regime in Iran is a functional is destroying the Arab region. It first started to demolish Iraq as one of the most important Arab countries. After occupying Syria and the destruction of that country, now the Iranian regime is resorting to destroying the mind of the youth by spreading prostitution and drugs in Syria, building seminaries, building graveyards, worshiping graves and worshiping idols, and extending its backward ideology.”
He added: “The current revolution in Iran, which is led by Mrs. Maryam Rajavi and the Iranian resistance, we stand with her to the bottom of our hearts. This revolution will triumph, God willing, and peace will be established in the region, and we will visit Sister Maryam Rajavi in Tehran, and we bless her and the Iranian people, and there will be a new world in the Arab and Islamic region.”